Colt Knost, the former PGA Tour pro turned CBS Golf analyst and radio/podcast host, turned heads earlier this week when he revealed that, after 18 years as a professional golfer, he had applied to regain his amateur status from the United States Golf Association.
Two decades ago, Knost was an elite amateur; in 2007, he joined Bobby Jones and Jay Sigel as the only players to win three USGA titles in the same year. (In Knost’s case, those wins came at the U.S. Amateur Public Links, the U.S. Amateur and, as part of a team effort, the Walker Cup.) For five weeks that year, Knost held the top spot in the World Amateur Golf Ranking before making his first start as a professional at the Valero Texas Open.
Knost joined the PGA Tour in 2009 and went on to notch nine top-10 finishes in his career and more than $4 million in earnings. He played his last full-schedule season in 2015-16 and retired from competitive golf following a missed cut at the 2020 Waste Management Phoenix Open. Two years later, he joined CBS as a full-time analyst.
When Knost, who now is 40, announced his desire to regain his amateur status, he said his decision was partly motivated by wanting to qualify for the U.S. Mid-Amateur, but that no one should be under the illusion that his game still packs the punch that it did when he was in peak form. On Wednesday, on Knost’s Sirius XM show, Knost added that he also has dreams of one day captaining a U.S. Walker Cup team, and that being an amateur “would probably help” his chances. None of that rationale, however, is likely to assuage critics of Knost’s (or, for that matter, any other longtime pro’s) move back to amateurism, some of whom have been popping off on social media.
